Category Archives: Danger

At seventeen he told me that he was never going to have children. I asked him why.

“I can’t do what you do,” he said.

Of course I know enough about psychological signs to know that he was telling me he intended to dodge the realities of life. I didn’t see what I could do about it at that time.

When he was about twenty, he was lethargic and sedentary. If I’d seen any other boy living in such a pattern, I’d have immediately guessed that he was a drug addict.

I was living in a distant city when my son called asking for money. I told him to go to my closest friend for it, and I’d pay my friend back. My friend, who is the founding president of his company, had a visitor in his office when my son was invited in to get the money.

As soon as the boy left with the money, the visitor commented, “The kid’s a junkie, eh.” It seems the visitor was a recovered heroin addict, and he recognized the signs. My friend was stunned, because he was in denial just as I was. As I said, if I’d seen any other young man with my son’s behavior, I would have known at once that he was an addict. But, because it was my own son, it didn’t occur to me, nor to my closest friend.

I warn you to avoid denial if you can. To subconsciously overlook something obvious is to succumb to denial. Denial can cause one to miss facts like your roommate is stealing your cosmetics; or the girl just doesn’t really like you. If you’re alert to denial, you might save yourself some unpleasant surprises.

Other people knew my son was a heroin addict. His mother and sister knew, and feared to tell me. I imagine the discomfort my friend suffered, when he knew he was going to tell me. That’s how I know he’s a true friend. He lives by a strong moral code, and recognizes that right and wrong are separate entities from legal and illegal.

Of course, the money I had given my son from time to time was spent on heroin. A star sapphire ring, a family heirloom that I passed on to him, went to the drug dealer I now realize. Similarly, a very elaborate breathing system I bought to protect him as he was working with fiberglass in the hulls of large sailing yachts under construction. I suppose he never used it, but traded it for heroin.

I met Arthur Closden last year, at the “No Shame” after hours club. I don’t go there often, but when they have a jazz musician that I like, I spend the entire evening at a side table near the front. I like to relax to the music and draw the musicians and audience members as the music inspires moods in me.

On this occasion, the group was Theresa Margolis and her band. The drummer, the keyboardist and the bassist were always with her throughout her career. I had long been a fan of the Margolis group, so I spent the evening, as I’ve said, at the table, sketching the musicians and some of the patrons. It was a rich treasure of characters.

One character was Arthur Closden. He studied the room from the entrance doorway, seeking a table in the full-house club. I watched as he spotted me, off to the side at a table alone and immediately made his way in my direction. He flowed among the tables like an eel gliding through obstacles. His long, boney legs moved with a smooth, swift gait that brought him to my table in just a few seconds.

He towered over the table from the opposite side, his long, boney face disguised by a handlebar mustache and long goatee. He wore a straw farmers’ hat and a thick tweed jacket with worn and faded leather patches on the elbows. His trousers appeared to be from a pinstriped suit, and the cuffs crumpled on well-worn desert boots from a previous era. Nothing on him was harmonious with anything else on him.

“D’yuh need ‘dis whole table?” he said, a threat hidden in his voice.

“Not at all,” I said. “Take a chair.” He didn’t say thanks, he just sat down and took a lined notebook out of his jacket pocket and three partly worn pencils. He ignored me, so I was able to watch him openly. I sketched him while the band got settled for this final set. When they began to play, I ignored Arthur and started sketching the musicians. I didn’t notice him watching me as I sketched until he asked me what I was doing.

“I’m just doing some preliminary sketches that I can refer to later, if I want to develop them further,” I said.

“You uh artist?” he grunted.

“An illustrator, actually,” I said. “I just like to do random art for my own pleasure.”

“D’yuh put it up anywhere?”

“Do you mean show? Not yet. Don’t know if I ever want to.”

“Dat’s idiotish.” He scoffed. “Yuh might git money!”

“I’m well paid for my illustrations, but I do them to order, for clients. I believe that putting a commercial motivation into my personal work would taint it.”

“What d’hell you talkin’ ‘bout?” he barked. “Y’some kinda commie?”

“I do my work in my studio, and earn a living at it.” I said. I was getting pissed off with Arthur Closden. “When I do things like these sketches, I’m nourishing myself, and this nourishment isn’t for sale”

“I’m sure you don’t mean that, friend,” I said. He was quite strange. I didn’t know what he might do.

I didn’t see Arthur Closden around for several weeks, and I forgot about him as my life filled up with other activities.

The next time I saw Arthur’s face, it was on my desktop monitor. He had used a high-powered hunting rifle to murder two publishers and three editors. I thought it was all talk, like Don Trump claiming he’s the rightful president of the United States. I wonder if I could have done anything to stop Arthur… or Donald.

Our grandfather, known as Paw, would hand out quarters to each of us cousins when we gathered at his house each Sunday. There were eight of us. There were only two girl cousins, sisters, and they were rarely with us on these Sunday visits.

We’d clutch our quarters and dawdle down the street to Lerby’s to buy licorice pipes and chocolate bars. Lerby’s was a small confectionary store at the corner of little Belview Street and busier Dunfield Avenue. That was in the nineteen fifties. Today, Lerby’s Smoke Shop would be known as a convenience store or milk store.

Most times, Mr. Lerby was upstairs in their apartment over the store. He liked to sleep a lot I guess, because he was very fat and drank a lot of beer. Mrs. Lerby liked some of the boys, and one day took Harvey into the back store. She knew the rest of us were stealing stuff out front, like Potato chips, chocolate bars and bubble gum. She didn’t care, it seemed.

When Harvey came out of the back store, he told us why Mrs. Lerby took him there. He said she wanted to play with his monkey.

“What monkey?” Paul said. “You ain’t got no monkey!”

“My dick, dickhead,” Harvey boasted. We were all aghast and dubious. “She called it my monkey and she played with it.” I asked him how? What did she do when playing with it?

“First she opened my fly and reached in to get my dick out of my underwear. Then she just looked at it with a smile on her face. She started to waggle it back and forth, and it got stiff and hard.” I looked around at Paul, Marty and Ricky. They were as spellbound by the story as was I.

Harvey kinda puffed himself up and took on an air of superiority. I could understand it. I had never had a woman see or touch my willy.

“She said it was ‘way bigger than she expected, and she took it into her mouth.”

“Oh my god!” Paul inhaled and caught his breath. We were afraid to know more.

Paul had a plan for the next Sunday. We went out to the old shed on the lane behind our grandparents’ home. There, we discussed Harvey’s adventure. Harvey filled us in on some of the unbelievable moments he enjoyed with Mrs. Lerby. It gave Paul an idea that he outlined for the rest of us. In the end, Paul talked Harvey into partnering him in his scheme.

The following Sunday, we gathered together to march down to Lerby’s store. In the store, we were milling around as usual, and Mrs. Lerby invited Harvey into the back store again. This was Paul’s opportunity to act. We didn’t know his plan until he suddenly went behind Lerby’s counter, unplugged the cash register and carried it away. We all ran out with whatever we had stolen and followed Paul. Harvey caught up to us a few minutes later and we all went to the old shed at the back of my grandparents’ yard.

Paul began trying to open the cash register. He pushed buttons, clawed at the drawer, banged on it with a stick. It would not open. Finally he heaved the heavy machine at the wall. It fell to the ground… unopened. Furious with frustration, Paul stormed out and went we don’t know where.

I walked over to the cash register, picked it up and placed it on a rickety little rough wood table. The electric cord hung down to the ground. I picked it up and reached up to the outlet thing that was screwed into the light fixture and the bulb was screwed into the outlet thing. The plug slid into the receptacle. The cash register buzzed for a second.

There was a button that said “No Sale”. I pushed it. The door slid open with a clang of a bell. When we divided up the money, we got $2.46 each. We took an equal share to Paul. We had enjoyed that Sunday more than usual.

An ordinary day in a boring car dealer showroom, I was chatting with one of my salesmen when I saw a man enter and look around. He was tall, lean, and with a boney face covered with character. He approached me, I guess, because I appeared to be the boss. He asked if there was a chance he could get a job in my dealership and I referred him to Helmsley, my sales manager. A few moments later I saw him heading for the door.

“What did he say,” I asked.

“He said no,” he replied.

I could see that this man needed help and was desperate to work and earn a living. I reversed the manager’s opinion and hired the man. As time passed, I saw that the man was energetic and eager to make sales. I also learned that when I hired him, he was just out of an eighteen month jail sentence for robbery. That explained the lean desperation and the sad old topcoat he wore. I also learned he had a wife and two sons that he was determined to raise well.

Over the years I became friends with the man, and got to know his family. When he came to visit at my home, my son and daughter joined us at the kitchen table, eager to hear the colourful stories he would tell. All of us were fascinated, not just by the stories, but while talking he would roll perfect cigarettes with one hand and smoke them. His dexterity was remarkable. He said one learns such things in prison.

He had been a daredevil motorcyclist in a travelling carnival, riding an old Indian bike around the inside walls of a large ball of metal lattice. On another tour, he hired a disabled boy to sit in a pit and bite the heads off live chickens. Another time, he rented a number of fetuses in jars of formaldehyde from a laboratory and made a midway exhibit called “Pickled Punks”. Only a criminal has such imagination.

He was not a street mug at his roots, however. He had attended an exclusive private school with the sons of dignitaries that later became dignitaries themselves. His father was a mining engineer in charge of a world famous mine in Northern Canada. Before that, his family had lived in British Guyana while his father managed a mine there.

Every opportunity for an average life was there for the man, and he chose wisely to follow his desire to have a life of excitement and adventure. I did the same, and I believe that’s why we were trusted friends with each other.

He passed away from cancer a couple of years ago. I’m glad he lived to see one of his sons rise to be a television writer/producer and marry well and provide grandchildren.

Are you one of them? The lovely women whose offices are in large downtown buildings? Are you one of the professionals that we see standing outside building entrances? Some of you cower in alcoves to escape the wind while you desperately suck in nicotine smoke. You know it’s killing you, you know it makes you smell, and it makes a fool of you as you stand out in the cold, feeding your addiction.

I’ll never forget the day I quit. I was behind the wheel of my car, stopped at a traffic light. On the corner, also waiting for the green light was a stunning woman. She was tall, lean, with excellent posture and a perfectly tailored business suit. Suddenly she lifted a cigarette I hadn’t seen to her lips.

In seconds, she became less attractive. As she let the two streams of smoke glide from her nostrils, she began nervously flicking, flicking, flicking non-existent ashes from her cigarette. At that moment she became completely unattractive to me.

The light turned green and I drove off. At that moment, the announcer on the car radio said, “It’s national quit smoking month, folks”. I thought that I must also look like a loser fool when I smoke. The thought punished me. When I got to my destination, I opened my briefcase, extracted the half-pack of Camel filters, crumpled it into dust and discarded it in a garbage bin.

I’ve not tasted tobacco in any form since that day almost thirty years ago.

We came to accept women at the range about ten years ago. There never were many there: Alice came usually with her husband, Carl; Mrs. Dagliesh still comes about once a month even though her husband Claude passed. Ms Laura Fletcher is a regular every Thursday evening – most of us think she’s lesbian. The other regular Thursday lady is Diane Moore. She’s a head shrinker… like a psychologist or psychiatrist or something. I don’t know the difference. She’s divorced from a Marine officer who got her interested in shooting.

I admit I was interested in her. So was every other single guy in the club, but all of us were a bit afraid to speak to her. We’re just a bunch of country boys, y’know, and none of us talks classy like Diane does. I can call her Diane ‘cause I went on a date with her.

I was afraid to hit on her, just like the others. I guess I just wanted to know her more than any other guy. Then Frankie, at work, pointed out that it won’t kill me to ask her. What’s the worst that could happen? Would she pull out her Colt .45 and blow your face off? Not likely, but she might get me from a long ways away with her Winchester. I’ve watched her score at the range, and she’s really too good. She shames me.

Something told me she was using target practice for more than relaxation. I just had a hunch that she might be up to something. That’s part of the reason why I went after her, sort of. I wanted to see if she was up to no good. She drove a BMW to the club, so I expected she’d have dough, but when she invited me back to her place I almost flipped. It’s a big house on the edge of the bluff overlooking the lake. It’s completely surrounded by dense forest. Diane said she bought up all the surrounding acreage to assure she’ll never have objectionable neighbours.

I asked her one time why she wanted to be so perfect with her weapons, since she never entered competitions. Without any change in her face, she simply sipped her coffee and said, “There are some people that need to be killed”.

I am always surprised at the casual way Americans regard and treat their firearms. They seem to see their handguns as simple accessories, rather than the lethal danger that they present by merely being present.

Your beloved ‘framers’ were careful to specify their gun law. Guns were meant to be in a legally organized militia against a common enemy. But millions of people believe that it says they can own, carry and show their guns no matter who they are. Wrong!

I am moved to write about it because I see that you gun lovers can get your favourite killing machine beautifully coated in shimmering colours.

I watch many real crime police investigation shows, like “48 Hours”. Many times, in telling the story, the victim or witness will say, “I took my gun out of my purse and…”.

Don’t you people realize that your casual acceptance of guns is insane? Thirty-three thousand gun deaths per year in the USA, Hillary Clinton said on television this morning.

A mom, a teacher, a lawyer, a doctor should not have a casual attitude toward firearms. They are deadly and should be recognized as extreme. I fear even visiting the USA because everybody has guns and some are crazy people.

The way I see it, millions of us might never be robbed or burgled, yet we must all be guarded all the time because some of us will be robbed or worse. It seems to me like a peculiar situation. There might be a pick-pocket in Wisconsin and I might be in Louisiana, but I have to watch my wallet because he might be here… maybe; or yet another thief might be standing near me now. Maybe not. Maybe.

Imagine if we were able to weed out all the crooks from this planet’s society. Nobody steals or lies or murders. No safe deposit boxes, no safes, no locks, no alarms, no surveillance cameras.

Actually, that seems rather bland. The bad guys are usually the most colourful. Unfortunately, some of them rape and kill and torture and so on, so we’d have to be selective about which criminals we’d allow to… stay.

I wonder about prison. Is it for rehabilitation? Is it for punishment? Is it for revenge? Is it to keep the bad guys out of society? In any case, it seems outrageous that that honest society my spend billions of dollars annually to house, feed, clothe, provide medical care and generally protect the inmates. Devil’s Island might have virtues.

I doubt I will ever understand why convicted murderers desire life in prison rather than death by gas or injection. I don’t understand what’s so horrible about death that one would rather live like a zoo creature than be gently put to sleep without pain. I don’t know why they fight to delay execution for decades. I would ask the judge for mercy, and have me executed at the earliest possible moment. Let’s get on with it. Everybody dies, but most don’t know when. I’d know.

Imagine a forest fire as is now destroying hundreds of homes around Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Imagine you get the kids, the cat, the dog and the spouse into the van and you run for your life. Looking back, the home you’ve loved and lived in for the lifetime of your children is not just burned… it’s gone.

The photo albums, the CDs, the family photos, that secret box you kept at the back of your sock drawer – gone forever. You and your children have to restart life and work to make it as it was.